


O Brightening Glance

by Emamel



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: 104th kids, And lots of dancing, Gen, Kink Meme, Minor Character Death, Plus a whole host of minor characters, scouting legion, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-15
Updated: 2014-03-15
Packaged: 2018-01-15 20:28:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1318129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emamel/pseuds/Emamel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Mikasa was still young enough to be carried everywhere she went, her mother would clasp her tight and spin them in slow, gentle circles, while her father hummed a gentle tune that she would later forget.</p>
<p>When she was six, she watched her father take her mother in his arms and swing them around the garden, their legs somehow tangling without tripping, heads thrown back in laughter, and she clapped along with the rhythm of their footsteps.</p>
<p>And when she was nine, a boy with a knife showed her a different kind of dance altogether.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> De-anoning from the kink-meme; the prompt for this story (as well as the fill) can be found http://snkkink.dreamwidth.org/2124.html?thread=1737036#cmt1737036 there. Hope you enjoy, and please, as you are reading this, keep in mind that I am in no way a dancer, and so know nothing (why did I do this to myself?)

 When Mikasa was still young enough to be carried everywhere she went, her mother would clasp her tight and spin them in slow, gentle circles, while her father hummed a gentle tune that she would later forget.

When she was four, her father lifted her onto his shoulders and kept his hands circled around her ankles so that she could watch the quick tap-tap of the dancers’ feet over the heads of the crowd.

When she was six, she watched her father take her mother in his arms and swing them around the garden, their legs somehow tangling without tripping, heads thrown back in laughter, and she clapped along with the rhythm of their footsteps.

When she was seven, she stood beside her mother and followed her precise movements, slow and graceful, a dance that had been passed down for generations, she said, a dance just for the two of them. Mikasa bit her lip and nodded earnestly.

And when she was nine, a boy with a knife showed her a different kind of dance altogether.

* 

The boy’s name was Eren, he told her outside in the cold, still air, and when he smiled it was nothing like the wicked-sharp grin of before; she looked down, at his feet, and remembered how they moved across the wooden floor of the shack, a quick one-two-three-four that matched the pounding of blood in her ears. She shivered once and closed her eyes against the sight, tried to forget the feel of blood beneath her hands, of the broken floorboard beneath her foot.

Eren asked if she was okay, if she was cold; she realised that she was, that she was chilled to the bone. When he wrapped his scarf around her neck, she could do little more than press her face into the worn and faded fabric and inhale. Eren smelt of lavender and sweat and hot metal. She didn’t know if she liked it, but she gripped the cloth a little tighter nonetheless.

By the time anyone arrived, the two of them had fallen asleep curled up together outside the wooden shack, Eren’s head lolling on Mikasa’s shoulder, mouths open and snoring gently.

They would remember nothing of the journey to Eren’s house, which was spent curled in the arms of two soldiers with Eren’s father walking grim-faced before them, but that evening when they lay side-by-side on Eren’s narrow straw pallet, they both opened their eyes to the darkness. Eren turned to her, took hold of her hand and asked if she regretted her decision to fight, to live. For a long time she turned the question over in her head, and when she fell asleep again, it was with a smile on her face.

 *

Armin, she came to understand, was not like Eren and her. Where words would often fail them, Armin could seemingly pluck them from thin air and mould them at will; he spun tales of the outside world that left her stunned and Eren breathless with excitement. Sometimes, he’d leap to his feet and drag Armin with him, spinning the boy in dizzy circles as they laughed and spoke of the day they’d finally get to the see the outside; they always sounded so certain that she could almost forget that such a thing was impossible.

It didn’t matter to her either way – outside the Walls or in, she was perfectly happy to watch Armin trip over his own feet as Eren tried to teach him how to focus his gaze as he turned so as not to become dizzy.

Not all of their moments together were so peaceful; Armin’s family, she learnt, had been branded heretics, liars and traitors. Should he already be with Eren and her, then there was rarely a problem (her ability to throw someone twice her size and weight was legendary, and the very sight of Eren commanded a peculiar respect) but sometimes he was left alone, and that was where the trouble would begin.

Armin was smart, and that was perhaps his biggest failing – in Shinganshina, intelligence meant nothing. The fact that he could already list off every major political figure in the Inner Wall, that he could defeat Eren’s father at chess, that he knew every weak spot the human body could possibly offer, was useless to him when surrounded and outnumbered.

So no, Armin was nothing like Eren and her, because while his mind was sharp as any scalpel, it was his body that could let him down.

And that was not a problem that she or Eren had ever had to worry about.

 *

The first time she saw Eren truly dancing, they were just inside of Wall Maria, and they were supposed to be gathering wood for the stove. As soon as they reached a quiet clearing, he dropped his bundle and stretched his arms towards the sky with a bright grin and a relieved sigh. Mikasa turned with an insult and reprimand ready on her tongue, both of which faded away to nothing when she saw that he was perfectly still, one leg lifted and poised behind him, forming a perfectly straight line with his torso. He had removed both of his shoes and his cardigan, and rolled up the legs of his trousers. She watched him lean forward to plant his hands on the ground and kick off, balancing his weight on his just his arms.

After a moment, his shirt slipped down over his steadily-reddening face and he collapsed into a laughing heap on the grass.

Mikasa had never seen anyone do something like that before, even when her father took her into town to watch the dancers with bells on their feet, and she told him so. Eren shot her a disbelieving look, but she was firm.

He relented eventually and showed it to her again, this time coming to stand with a graceful roll, spinning to face her with a broad grin. His mother taught him how to do it, he explained, and showed her again until eventually she also dropped her bundle of sticks and tried it too. Soon after, she wondered what the big deal was – standing on her hands was very much like standing on her feet, except everything was upside down and her scarf dragged along the ground.

She didn’t like handstands, she decided, and righted herself quickly.

In return, she showed Eren the dance that her mother had taught her – he followed her well, his movements fluid and graceful, but she could see that he was not suited to such a slow dance. He nearly vibrated with excess energy, although the whole purpose of the dance was to promote a sense of tranquillity; or so her mother had said. _Just the two of them_ , she thought a little guiltily, before she shook it off. The dance was for her family, and Eren was her family.

As they gathered up their pitiful haul that afternoon, both red-faced and panting with excursion after a day literally dancing circles around one another, Mikasa couldn’t help but realise that this was the first time she’d danced since the death of her parents.

 *

Shinganshina  was unlike anywhere else within the Walls on the Day of Sacrifice – Mikasa’s own memories of it revolved around a day of quiet contemplation, of eating dinner with her parents and walking through the woods with them hand-in-hand. Small gifts had been exchanged, and it was the one day of the year that she was allowed to climb the enormous blossoming tree in the back garden, even while her mother watched from the gaps between her fingers.

The further inside the Walls you went, the stricter the celebrations became, or so she heard – it was the ruling of the King that the day be spent in silent thanks for the gift of the Walls, that no gifts be exchanged, that no food or alcohol be consumed within those twenty-four hours as a reminder of humanity’s suffering before the glory of the Walls, but the Military Police could only enforce this in so many places, and by the time they got to the outer districts, well.

As the last town to be sealed away from the rest of the world, the citizens of Shinganshina felt that they ought to celebrate in a manner befitting humanity’s escape from the titans.

Not all agreed with them of course – Armin’s tormenters were some of the few that followed such strange traditions devoutly. They, along with the members of the ever-growing Wallist religion could shriek ‘heretic’ all they liked, Armin told her one day, a strangely smug note in his voice as they watched Eren leap almost effortlessly from one rooftop to the next, shouting taunts at the larger boys. In this matter, they were outnumbered for once.

Mikasa had spent hours that evening with Eren and Armin, each of them with a small scrap of triangular fabric in their hands, trying to sew on the most elaborate designs that they could manage. Eren had explained to her earlier that it was a tradition for every child in Shinganshina to make one, and to decorate it however they so choose – then, all of the triangles would be gathered up and pinned carefully onto lengths of yarn that would be strung between the houses. ‘Bunting’, he said it was called, and Armin was quick to add that she didn’t have to join in if she didn’t want to, that if she would rather celebrate the way her family had, then that was fine too.

She thought of her mother and father, of their smiling faces as they whirled in giddy circles, thought of the embroidery that her mother had shown her, and picked up a needle and thread.

 *

On the day of the festival she remained close by Eren and Armin, quietly overwhelmed. Her fingers were sticky-sweet with honey and fruit juices – the streets were lined with vendors selling every manner of food that she could possibly have imagined, along with even more that she couldn’t. Eren had thrust a flaky pastry into her hands, handing over one of the silver coins given to him by his mother for the festival to the elderly woman behind the stall. She thanked him enthusiastically, and praised the ‘Jaeger boy’ for his generosity. He called it a baklava, and broke off a piece to stuff into his mouth, before he grinned at her through a mouthful of crumbs.

She couldn’t help but grimace at the sight, which only served to make him laugh harder.

Armin, on the other hand, looked gloomily at the stalls, and paid them no attention until Eren disappeared for a couple of minutes and came back with a paper bag of skewered meat, marinated in spices and cooked over charcoal until almost black. At that, Armin brightened considerably – later, when he had run off to find his grandfather, Eren confided that they were Armin’s favourites, but the spices made them incredibly expensive. As he lived with only his grandfather, Armin never liked to pay the extra for them – Eren, on the other hand, was the son of a respected doctor, and the three-time Queen of the festival. If he couldn’t technically afford the wares, he was given some small leeway.

Some of the vendors had been preparing for this weeks, even months in advance, Eren had told her as they explored. The Day of Sacrifice was very important to them, both from a business and a personal viewpoint.

Interesting as it was, though, it wasn’t the food that had made the day special.

In the centre of town the plaza, normally so empty and quiet, was alive with bright, quick beats – instruments that she had never seen before, and with names that she couldn’t pronounce even when told, and hundreds of people, all packed tightly together, dancing. She had never seen anything like it before – she turned to Eren, to try to pull him forward into the crowd, but he laughed and shook his head. He was dancing with his mother later, in the competition, he explained, so he had to save his energy.

Instead, she danced with two of the girls that lived on the same street as them – she knew them only by sight, but it didn’t seem to matter. She could have been dancing with strangers and she suspected she would have been perfectly happy.

It wasn’t the sort of dancing that she was used to, but her feet knew the rhythm even if she did not. One-two-three-one-two-three, turn, sway, the vibrations of hundreds of feet pulsed through her chest until it felt that her heart was keeping time with every other citizen. The day was warm, unusually so for the time of year, and sweat trickled down her face, down her back – she couldn’t bring herself to care, arms above her head and feet shuffling and stamping in time with the drumbeats.

Here and there she could see members of the Stationary Guard dotted in amongst the crowd; those that hadn’t managed to get the afternoon shift off stared moodily from the edges. So close to the outside world, the laws of the Inner City were almost completely forgotten, the military as much a part of the people as any other line of work. Her gaze skipped over the crowd, which seemed nothing more than a sea of bright colours, everyone having brought out their very best clothes for the celebration. The smell of sweat hung heavy in the air, but every so often a breeze would cut down through the streets, and with it came a gust of fresh, sweet air. She took deep, steadying breaths, and let them all out again when one of the girls grabbed her by the arm.

They swung in circles until they were almost ready to collapse, but still Mikasa could feel her body moving desperately with the music, all thoughts of anything else fled from her mind.

She caught sight of Armin amongst the musicians, sat beside his grandfather, playing a rounded string instrument that she wasn’t sure she recognised, a distant smile on his face.

Eventually, though, the dancing came to an end, and a space was cleared in the plaza – one of the Stationary Guard announced the beginning of the competition through a military-issued megaphone, and for a while the cheering was too loud for him to be heard even with it. Once the crowd had settled, he turned to the list in his hand, calling out the name of the first group of dancers.

Most of the groups were families, Mikasa quickly came to realise, watching them from her perch on a rooftop. She hadn’t realised that there were so many different types of dance, particularly for such large groups.

The first group to step forward was made up of ten people, and they relied on no music, only the clapping of hands and their own voices – despite herself, Mikasa found that she couldn’t help but clap along, swaying in time with the beat. They moved in perfect synchrony, every shuffle and turn performed as one; first in a circle, then, so gradually that she almost didn’t notice until they had formed a line of cheering, grinning faces. It was not a quick dance, nor a particularly graceful one, but she could see the strength in every line of their bodies, could see the sweat gleaming on sun-darkened skin.

After that, many of the dances seemed to blend together as she kept a watch for Eren and his mother; some were performed as groups as large as twenty, that consisted of ducking and weaving around one another, of complex gestures and so many quick steps that she could barely keep up. Some used props; sticks, or ribbons, or bells that glinted in the sun. Some dancers performed as pairs – slowly, gracefully, twirling across the cobbled ground as though they were lighter than air, whilst others took a less refined and more energetic approach. Mikasa could feel her heart racing as she watched men and women throw one another into the air, only to catch them inches from the ground; she watched people contort themselves into positions that should be impossible and hold themselves there, but all the while it seemed blurred and distant to her.

When Eren and his mother finally stepped out, she felt her breath catch in her chest.

She had grown used to the drab clothes, the gentle smiles and the warm hands, but the two people that sauntered into the plaza were nothing like that.

Gone was Carla’s floor-length skirt and apron, to be replaced by dark, soft trousers; rather than a blouse, she wore a close-fitting shirt of the same shade as the trousers – Eren wore similar garb, and the only splashes of colour were the sashes tied about their waists and the flowers woven tightly into their hair. For the first time that Mikasa could remember, Carla wore her hair braided down her back to keep it out of her face – she ignored the whistles and catcalls from the crowd with the air of a goddess looking down upon the mortal realm.

Eren simply glared.

They were announced by the Guard, and the sound of their names drew the loudest cheer yet.

* 

Mikasa was simply disappointed that she didn’t get a chance to compete – to show off her own dance, the piece of her mother’s history. Carla stroked a gentle hand over her hair, and Eren eagerly babbled about next year, and how hard she’d have to try if she wanted to beat the so-far undefeated Jaeger.

She nodded to herself and thought of next year, the next festival.

 *

“I’m going to join the military,” Eren says his voice still wrecked, tears streaming down his face. Armin sits beside him, eyes wide and staring off at something she can’t see. Mikasa tells him what a bad idea it is, but she doesn’t try to stop him. She knows him better than that.

Instead, she thinks of honey-sticky hands, and feet that can’t stop stamping with a beat, and most of all, a plaza full of people all dancing as one.


	2. Chapter 2

The 3DMG cradles her; she can feel the strain that it is putting on her legs, but she doesn’t bother to shift her weight. This is only the introductory session, a way of ensuring that she has the necessary balance and spatial awareness that will allow her to use the gear to its full extent. She thinks back to her time spent with the Jaeger family, of the thousand-and-one sayings that Carla always seemed to be ready with.

_Dancing needs a strong core,_ had been one of her favourites. _Without a strong centre, you can’t dance._

Eren had scoffed, she remembers, sure that his mother was about to say something clichéd about the nature of the soul or something of the sort. Instead, she had prodded his stomach with a gentle finger and laughed, telling him that he needed to strengthen his abdominal muscles if he ever wanted to be any good.

Mikasa had trained alongside him, gently mocking when it became clear that she had more of a natural affinity for strength exercises and training.

She tenses her stomach, keeping Carla’s words in mind, and hangs perfectly still. Taking note of the wobbling recruits around her, she can’t help but acknowledge the warmth in the pit of her stomach when she realises that this is something that she has a talent for. She will be allowed to continue training.

Allowed to stay with Eren.

 *

Eren is devastated, and neither Armin nor she can wrap their minds around what’s happening. Of all of the aspects of their training, this is the one that they had all been so sure that he would excel in; the use of the 3DMG relies on the user’s balance, strength, stamina, spatial awareness, and ability to think their way through stressful situations. All of the fields are things that Eren has proven himself to be proficient in.

So his inability to remain upright is a mystery to the three of them.

He asks around for advice, asks any of the recruits that will listen to him, but they don’t suggest anything that hasn’t already occurred to him, nothing that he hasn’t already tried. She and Armin sit close to him at dinner that evening, warmth bleeding through their sleeves in the hopes of comforting him. It’s hard to be sure, given the determined set of Eren’s shoulders, but she thinks that it works.

That evening when she’s returning to the girls’ barracks having returned her gear to the armoury where it will be locked away for the night, she finds Eren balancing on his hands, and after a few minutes, he lowers himself back to ground, only to rise onto the ball of his left foot, picking up his right behind him. Balancing in one position, waiting for a few minutes before trying another; he repeats this enough times that she eventually stops counting. She doesn’t move towards him until he crumples in on himself, arms wrapped around his head.

Hurrying forward, she reaches out to touch his shoulder – he lets her, having recognised the sound of her footsteps, perhaps. He’s always said that they have a very distinctive rhythm. She’s always said that he’s speaking nonsense.

“I was worried that I’d forgotten,” he whispers, voice wavering. She nods; he doesn’t need to say anything more for her to understand.

Their time on the landfill had been tough on the three of them, and there had been no opportunity for any pursuits that could not earn them money; subsequently, Eren’s self-imposed training schedule had suffered. Clearly, his failure to immediately master the 3DMG has served as something of a wake-up call to him.

“You haven’t,” she says gently. “You’ll never forget, Eren, you know that.”

He nods miserably, but she can see the resolution in the set of his shoulders, in the curve of his mouth.

The next day, when he manages to stay strong – _a strong core, all of that determination turned inwards and focused_ – even with his broken gear, Mikasa can’t honestly say that she is surprised.

 *

For all of his initial scoffing, Jean is quick to come to Eren seeking help. Or, perhaps more accurately, he comes to Mikasa seeking help, but as they are rarely out of one another’s company, it is inevitable that he also comes to Eren.

Armin watches the scene unfold with the air of a cat watching a mouse with a broken leg.

After the initial aptitude test, it quickly became clear that the two of them are competing in the top spot as far as their use of the gear goes. In other aspects, Eren often falls short, but his ability to push through any of his negativity leaves him with a firm spot in the top ten. He is not a natural soldier, but then, he is still a child. They are all still children, and warfare should not feel natural to any of them.

Somehow, though, it does, and she keeps her lips pressed tightly together.

Jean’s embarrassment seems to linger in the air, even after he’s finally managed to ask her how it is that she adapts so quickly to her 3DMG, and she silently eyes him for a few seconds, wondering how best to frame her answer. Never has she thought of herself as a good teacher – she’s always learned best through imitation and practical application, but she knows that she is rare in that sense. Most people prefer to have an explanation first. Eren is like her, she knows, so maybe Armin would be best in this instance. Out of all of them, he has the best understanding of the theory of the gear and how to effectively utilise it, even if he sometimes struggles to then act on it. More than that, though, he is observant; she knows that he will be able to explain best what her instincts do for her.

“Your legs aren’t strong enough,” Eren says. “Your legs take most of your weight, and if you want to use the gear properly, you have to focus on them.”

_Strong foundations make strong houses._ It had been one of Carla’s favourites.

Despite the glare that Jean levels in Eren’s direction, Mikasa can’t help but grin when she walks in on him doing squats that evening.

 *

Late in the summer of that year, or perhaps the early autumn, Mikasa comes to understand exactly how little she knows about the workings of the places within the Walls – having grown up inside of Wall Maria, she’d always thought of herself as something of an expert, at least compared to Eren and Armin, who had only ever lived inside of Shinganshina.

When Thomas, Nack and Mina gather around the same table, chattering excitedly, she doesn’t think much of it. Even after Millius brings over a tray of food stacked so high that he can barely carry it, she doesn’t really notice; the four of them had been saving up their ration cards for a couple of weeks, so she had expected it to culminate in something like this for a little while. As such, she pays them no mind until she hears Sasha question one of them about it – the girl had been drawn in by the sight of so much extra food, no doubt.

“It’s about this time that we’d be celebrating the harvest back home,” Mina explains brightly. The others gathered around the table all nod, already stuffing their mouths with food, seemingly without a care in the world. Mina’s explanation doesn’t clarify a great deal for her, though, and so she turns to Armin.

“It probably would have been the only time that poorer rural communities had enough to eat,” he murmurs. “It’s not surprising that they would celebrate with a feast of some sort.”

Mikasa nods, and pretends not to notice the way that their faces light up when the table quickly fills with plates and people and laughter.

_The next year would see them all saving their rations for weeks beforehand, and gathering late-blooming flowers for decorations, and being taught to weave baskets by Mina, and how to make kites from useless scraps of fabric by Samuel, and neither she, nor Eren nor Armin would reveal why the honey-drenched fruits made their breath catch in their throats._

*

In the first year of training, she cries exactly once. The evening before the Day of Sacrifice, she lies awake for hours, fist pressed against her mouth to muffle the soft sounds threatening to escape; she buries her face in the hard pillow and hopes that the tears will stop before they soak right through and stain the fabric a salty mess.

No matter how hard she clings to her memories of before, with her family, and the one blindingly bright year with Eren’s family, she can feel them slipping away from her already. The dull repetition and monotony the military drums into them pushes her memories further away each day. Mostly she can handle that – Mikasa’s always thought of herself as practical, and her ability to push anything unnecessary from her mind is what has allowed her to come so far, but now.

Oh, now.

Now the tears come without pause, and she gasps for breath around the catch in her throat and hopes that no-one can hear her, because how could she ever explain this emptiness, the hollow cavern in her chest? She tries to stifle the sobs and instead focus on her heartbeat, but the sound is weak and out of time, so instead she thinks of drumbeats, counting out the tempo until her breathing settles.

She doesn’t remember falling asleep, but when she wakes the next morning her head is pounding and her eyes feel swollen and sore.

No-one comments on it; not even when they see Eren and Armin in a similar state.

Being in the military, they are afforded a few luxuries – unlike so many, they are not required to fast on the Day of Sacrifice, with the understanding that doing so would interfere with their ability to carry out their duties. The new recruits especially; they are still children, still growing and learning. They have not yet developed the sharp, roughened edges that they will need, nor have they yet needed to. It is something that will be corrected in their time here, she is sure, but for now their food rations remain as they ever were.

There are, of course, those that choose to honour the traditions set out by the King; Eren scowls, and his mutters of ‘cattle’ aren’t quite as quiet as she would have liked, but no-one dares to start a fight. Not today.

Somehow, the day seems to drag on, each minute stretching out until it felt hours had passed, each hour another lifetime away.

Despite it all, though, she makes it through as though it is a day like another other, as though her head isn’t spinning, and her vision overtaken by the bold slashes of fabric that spun out in time with whirling bodies. She makes it through the day, and when the night falls, she stands shivering in the dark outside, knowing that there will be no checks tonight, that she doesn’t need to worry about being outside long after she is meant to be asleep.

She is not kept waiting long.

Eren steps out, hand in hand with Armin, already pulling the boy into a bastardised waltz that has them tripping over each other’s feet, laughing and clumsy. For a moment, a brief incandescent moment, it is as though the past few years have not happened, as though they are joyously weaving their way home after the festival, still full to the brim with the restless urge to keep dancing. To keep moving.

The two of them dance together for a little while, their light-hearted back-and-forth stirring something twisted and painful in her chest. She hates the lot that they have been dealt, hates that there should ever be times when they aren’t this gentle and soft around the edges; she thinks back to the night in the woods, and the boy with the knife, and she wonders how it is that that the fire in his eyes could ever give way to such cold fury. Turning her gaze to Armin, she thinks of how much he has grown already, how hard this has been for him. He is not like the two of them – he is not suited to this life.

Then again, maybe none of them are. Maybe it is simply that she and Eren are better at lying to themselves.

Armin, despite having little natural talent for dancing, thinks in patterns, and in numbers, and in thousands of tiny details that Mikasa could never wrap her mind around, and so it doesn’t take long for him to begin anticipating Eren’s movements.  Eren, it seems, can’t stick with one rhythm or style for very long, but Armin doesn’t look as though he minds, laughing even as he keeps his eyes firmly on their feet.

Eventually, it is Armin that breaks away, spinning apart from Eren to pull Mikasa forwards – she leads him through some simple steps first, trying to adjust to the feel of dancing with someone shorter than her. His movements are a little stiff, and his natural rhythm doesn’t quite match hers, but she soon realises that it doesn’t matter.

His hand in hers is rough, the skin broken in places, callouses already starting to form, and she knows that hers are the same. Somehow they manage to turn a few easy circles before their feet overlap, knees knocking together – for some reason that she can’t be bothered to identify, they all find it hilarious, clinging to one another in their efforts to stay upright as they laugh as loud as they dare in the still night.

She isn’t surprised when Eren drags her closer to him and turns her in a loose arc. Neither of them follow any formal style of dance; they know each other well enough that they don’t have to, and each step is a new discovery, something that’s never been done before, at least not this night. Sometimes she lets Eren lead, and sometimes she’ll catch him off guard, stepping forward rather than back. He is always able to follow her movements, reading her intentions in every subtle shift of her weight. He retaliates by sweeping her legs out from beneath her and lowering her into a dip; she huffs when she realises that she recognises the action.

She has a feeling that Annie’s lessons will continue to influence Eren’s dancing.

Though she can outmatch him in strength and speed, Mikasa can’t gain an advantage for more than a few seconds – they are too accustomed to one another for that, adapting to each minute twitch of muscles, feet drifting in easy patterns, dragging senseless images into the dust.

They always seem to end up like this; not truly a competition, but a test of sorts nonetheless. It’s the reason that they are no longer paired together when sparring. Originally, it had been thought that their similar heights and builds would make them ideal, but the truth is, their fights seem more like routines, with neither laying a hand on the other. It reminds her of the times that Eren asks her to practice his Jaeger with him.

He’s only ever taught her some of the steps, but that doesn’t matter. There is no set pattern to the dance; it mostly relies on Eren’s ability to improvise, and her own ability to anticipate his movements. Her grip on him tightens only slightly – he takes it as the warning it is. His grin is wild, ferocious, almost, eyes bright under the dim light spilling from wooden hut. He squeezes back.

Eren’s hands are soft, she realises.


	3. Chapter 3

There are times that sleep doesn’t come easily to her. Mostly, Mikasa is able to shut her eyes and fall away from reality almost immediately, but some nights she can lay awake for hours on end without feeling the heavy tug of sleep, no matter how exhausted she is. On nights like this, she will pad carefully from her bed, from the barracks, bare feet quieter even than their treated leather boots. The dusty ground is still warm from the days of relentless heat.

After a year of intensive training, she has long since learned the patterned movements of the guards, and so she slips by them as a shadow, her presence not warranting even a twitch. By the morning, her footprints will have been smoothed away by the wind.

Dotted around the edge of the training fields there are trees – huge trees that she had never seen before her arrival here, that she could not recognise, much less put a name to. She heads towards them no with the sound of laughter rattling in her skull and the scent of cherry blossom clinging to her memory. When she reaches the trees she doesn’t stop, just changes direction.

The leaves provide adequate cover for a young girl that knows how to hide away. Despite that, she isn’t alone for long.

Annie can move far more silently than Mikasa, and so it is no surprise that she didn’t know that she was being followed until the other girl appeared at the base of the tree. Suspected, yes – one didn’t survive two years as a Wall Maria refugee without learning a few tricks here or there – but suspecting is not the same as knowing. Neither girl looks at one another. They do not speak; if there are words between them, they do not spring forth. Annie stares down at her knuckles – the skin is smooth and pale, and even from her perch several feet up, Mikasa can see that they are unscarred.

She stares down at her own hands – dry and dark and torn apart, though not as much as she remembers her mother’s being. A woman that had had to work hard all of her life, she’d had the hands of a farmer and the delicate grip of an artist. Mikasa weaves her fingers together and presses her nails into her skin.

There is the lingering smell of sweat in the air – training finished later and later now that the evenings had grown long again, and most recruits collapsed on their bunks without changing or bathing. Mikasa is no exception; she doubts that Annie is either.

“I’m sorry,” Annie says eventually. Her voice is even, barely more than a whisper and muffled by the rustling of the leaves. Mikasa tilts her head but does not look down.

“For what?” She asks. There is a pause, thick and heavy and pressing down on her shoulders.

“I don’t know,” Annie says. “Just sorry, I guess. For everything.” Mikasa sighs, stands, stretches. There’s no point in staying out any longer; this is the most that Annie has spoken to her, but it seems the girl isn’t inclined to say anything further.

“Don’t be sorry yet,” Mikasa says. “Be sorry when you get out there and you have something to regret.”

 

 *

 

Sasha is bright and intelligent and fiercely optimistic, so much so that at times it can make Mikasa want to kill her or hold her tight and never let go. Sometimes she is reminded almost painfully of Armin and Eren and their absolute certainty of a future beyond the confines of the Walls. For them, it had never been a dream; rather a reality that the rest of the world had yet to catch up to. Sasha’s burning eyes and wicked smile is not quite the same, but her unrelenting cheer is childlike. Mikasa can’t help but wonder how much of it is forced.

When the girl catches Armin and Mikasa bluffing their way through the steps that Eren makes up as he goes along, it is hardly a surprise that she immediately joins in. Her mind moves as quickly as her carefree feet and she follows along with the seeming ease of a natural.

Shortly after she brings them all down into a rough-and-tumble heap when she makes the mistake of trying to anticipate Eren’s next move. The snort of laughter from Armin at her mistake is enough to make Mikasa forgive her.

Her breath leaves her with a soft _oomph_ when a new weight joins the others. She has to crane her neck around to see, and it’s a miracle that she doesn’t groan aloud when she catches sight of Connie happily sat on Sasha’s back. His grin stretches across his face until his eyes are forced shut by his cheeks. Sasha seems caught between laughing until she falls over again and shoving Connie off into the dirt, so in the end she does both.

“You guys are really good,” Sasha says when she’s finally caught her breath. She’s still smiling, but now it is smaller; a secret little thing that’s crept across her face while Mikasa was distracted.

“Not really,” Eren says – his voice is pleased in the way he sometimes gets, in the way that means he doesn’t want anyone to know how flattered he really is. “But we used to dance a lot in Shinganshina. Everyone did.” Sasha’s smile grows.

“What kind?”

“What?” Mikasa asks, standing up and brushing herself off – the clouds of dust settle at her feet, staining her boots brick-red.

“What kind of dancing did you do?” Her eyes are fever-bright in skin burnt and darkened and cracked by the sun. Her smile, her enthusiasm, is catching – Connie has dragged himself back to his feet and is following their conversation with interest. Eren and Armin are leaning into one another, heads bent close so that the tips of their hair brush. She doesn’t realise that she is leaning close too until she feels the brush of Eren’s hand, sees his lips curve slightly. He shrugs at Sasha, and she feels it up the length of her arm.

“All sorts,” he replies, and there is a challenge in Sasha’s stance now.

Connie is almost pulled off of his feet when she grabs his hand – he recovers quickly and grabs Eren, who grabs Mikasa, who grabs Armin; she doesn’t know what they’re doing precisely, but Sasha calls instructions while they stumble along behind, positions effectively reversed.

Mikasa, for all of her grace and her practice, finds that she trips over her feet like a child; she nearly drags the whole line down with her. It grows in steady increments – first Marco joins in, his face ruddy beneath his freckles, and it takes only a word from him for Jean to tail along on the end. Mina pulls Annie into the fray with Thomas and Nack close behind; it requires no coercion at all from Christa to encourage Ymir to join them. Sasha is an unpredictable leader, taking them in twisting paths and winding circles, until they’re so dizzy that it’s a miracle any of them can stand. Reiner, the last to join the stampede, seems at times to be the only thing keeping them upright.

Out of the corner of her eye, Mikasa thinks that she sees their instructors, standing in the shadows. They do not come forward to stop them.

She thinks she sees them smiling.

 

*

 

They don’t talk about it, pretend not to notice the empty bed at the end of the room. Her name was Lena, and Mikasa had spoken to her only twice. The girl had been talented with her blades, and quick on her feet, but she struggled desperately with the 3DMG, despite the late-night training sessions that she thought were a secret. No-one’s entirely sure what happened. Mikasa isn’t sure if she would make more of an effort, paid the girl more attention if given another chance. Hindsight, so the saying goes, is both a blessing and a curse.

Mina’s eyes are still red with tears.

Lena’s not the first to fail the training in their class, but she is the first to leave the barracks in a coffin. Mikasa doesn’t know what’ll happen to her body now; doesn’t know if she had a family to be returned to.

There is a small graveyard nearby, full of the shallow graves and cheap wooden crosses of the trainees that never made it to the battlefield; a constant warning to each of them of the difficult and dangerous life that they had chosen for themselves. The death of a comrade is not a thing to be taken lightly, but the death of a friend must be a thousand times worse. Mikasa lost one family, and most of another yet she feels helpless in the face of the grief that hangs heavy over the barracks. It is almost a tangible thing that rests on her hunched shoulders.

She doesn’t know what to do. No matter how many times she must see this, she doesn’t think she’ll ever know what to do.

In the years since the death of her parents, she has not wished for their presence often. It is not that she doesn’t miss them; she misses them with every breath she takes and every heartbeat that carries her further from them. But she doesn’t wish them back here, in the prison of the Walls, in the constant fear and hurt and anger. She wants them here now.

Her mother had a talent for wiping dry the tears and stemming their flow, while her father could take a grieving mind and turn it to any subject of his choosing until all thoughts of unhappiness were chased far away. They would know what to do, she thinks.

With no plan at all, she joins the misshapen huddle upon the ground, adding in her own blankets and pillows to the mess. She remains on the outskirts of the group, curled protectively around them. Perhaps they will be in trouble when they are discovered like this in the morning – or perhaps not. This is, after all, the first time any of them have truly lost a comrade since coming to this place. Maybe they will be granted some leniency.

Annie watches from her bed, dry eyes fixed on Mina.

 

*

 

 Mikasa nearly forgets her birthday.

It shouldn’t be as surprising as it is – keeping track of the days that go by is not easy when it seems as though every minute of every hour of every day is taken up by training, or eating, or sleeping. She’s exhausted and hungry and supremely confused when Armin and Eren, both hiding grins, ambush her on her way to the mess – with their arms looped through hers, they steer her in the opposite direction, and she allows it because it’s _them_.

It’s not the first time they’ve snuck away of course; deception is a game and they like to think of themselves as professionals, but she is confused. Normally they all plan ahead for this sort of thing.

Getting to the nearest town is easy – once they’ve slipped past the patrols it is a ten minute walk along a pleasantly flat stretch of road. They are recognised on occasion, and from time to time they have to duck back into alleys and darkened stoops to avoid the eyes of their superior officers, but they make it work. Today, however, it seems that they have something different in mind.

The significance of it doesn’t register with her immediately, but she finds herself pressing her hands against her mouth to keep the sounds escaping. They are not as far from the edge of the training facilities as she would like, and she doesn’t dare risk them being caught now.

“Don’t worry,” Armin says, eyes bright even in the gloom. “The guards won’t bother with us.”

She wonders how they managed to swing that for a few seconds before noticing the look on Eren’s face and decides that maybe she’s better off not knowing.

The cherry tree is glorious, even in the half light, and so very like the one that she remembers climbing as a child. She had never climbed it on her birthday before, but then, it may have proven difficult to sneak out on the Day of Sacrifice, even for the three of them. It is no surprise to her that they knew, that they remembered all these years later; she has told them everything about herself, after all. But she had never imagined, never even dared dream that she might be allowed another birthday like this. The fall of Wall Maria had crushed any such whimsical notions long ago.

From the top of the branches, the view is splendid. Though she has long forgotten her hunger, Eren produces sweet buns packed with dried fruit that she can’t even identify, and Armin reveals a flask of warm milk with just the faintest hint of sugar. She has no clue how they managed to procure such a fine birthday feast, and she chooses not to ask.

They stay there to watch the break of dawn; though not the best birthday she has ever had, Mikasa thinks that it is most certainly her favourite.

 

*

 

They graduate; Mikasa is the top of the class, and she feels something like hope unfurl deep within her chest. Whether he needs it or not, she wants to be able to protect Eren, to stand by his side and even begin to repay him for the gift of her survival.

And then everything goes to hell.

 

*

 

She feels it, impossible though it may be, feels the sudden stop as Eren – no. She can’t think about that, can’t afford to focus on anything other than the task that she has been given. Trost is crawling with titans and with stupid humans and she can’t. Let herself. Be. Distracted.

Nonetheless, the entire structure of the military crumbles before the threat of the titans, and everything is thrown into chaos. Few follow their orders properly, and no-one is where they are meant to be. She is not missed when she slips away, killing two titans as she passes. She doubts that any of the soldiers still remaining in that area could pick her out anyway; she is moving too quickly, using up too much gas and stamina in her haste to return to her friends, to return to Eren’s side.

After that, everything is a blur.

Her limbs feel heavy, heavier than she can possibly explain, yet she forces them into the practiced motions that have become second nature after so many years. She’s being reckless, foolish, even, but if it’s motivated the others into getting to safety –

The ground is hard, and hitting it at such speed knocks the breath from her lungs, tears the skin from her hands, thrown forward instinctively to protect herself. She’s out of gas, carries no reserves – there hadn’t been time after the appearance of the colossal titan to think so far ahead. Something as simple as that should have been obvious, but it doesn’t matter now. Of course it doesn’t. _What’s done is done,_ Eren used to say. One of his mother’s many sayings. They used to joke that she had one for every occasion.

_Eren_.

She can feel the shaking of the earth beneath her, the tell-tale vibrations of an approaching titan; she doesn’t move, doesn’t even make the attempt. Why? What for? She’s already failed; Eren had given her back a life so many years ago. Now that she can’t return his gift, his favour, why shouldn’t she just… sit here?

When the titan appears around the corner, she doesn’t react. There is no fear sinking her heart and twisting her stomach, no horror flooding her veins, no fight left in her bones.

No. No, she can’t. She has no gas, and her blades have dulled in the flesh of titans.

_If you win, you live. If you lose, you die._

But she’s already lost, hasn’t she?

The ground is shaking again, or maybe it’s just her heartbeat rattling through her, the quick one-two-three-four of blood in her ears. She knows the sound, remembers this scene – she’s seen it before. Remembers the dance with the knife, remembers the sound of Eren’s footsteps against the floorboards.

Eren’s always said that he could recognise the sound of her footsteps; he said that they have a very distinctive rhythm. She always said that he was speaking nonsense.

She knows these footsteps.

 

*

 

Eren’s skin is burning, and her skin reddens in the steam of the titan corpse, but she clutches him tight and listens hard, ear pressed against his chest. His heartbeat is strong and quick, a reassuring thud-thud.

Armin clasps Eren’s hand in his own and they lean together in the dissolving mess that surrounds them.


	4. Chapter 4

At his trial, they call him Eren Volkov, and no-one bothers to correct them. It is the name that he enlisted with, though the military care nothing for liars; they are, after all, desperate. And it is, she supposes, his father’s name – that Eren has chosen to keep his mother’s title, even after all these years, shows his disdain for his remaining parent.

Perhaps it will cause confusion at a later date; assuming of course that there will still be a later date.

She can’t bear to feel as helpless as she does now. It makes her want to claw her skin to ribbons, to rip and tear and shred and get away or _do something_. Anything.

But she stands, still and silent, and lets Armin rest his hand on her arm; they both know that he couldn’t stop her, not if she didn’t want to be stopped, but she allows them both the pretence. Allows him to whisper in her ear to wait and to watch and _look._ So she looks and looks until she sees what it is that the courtroom has missed. Not that she can blame them, of course. They’re all idiots.

Eren’s head whips to the side, and the blood is real enough, but she keeps her eyes on the captain and wonders just how he is getting away with this. She can only assume that the bigoted fools in the audience are seeing exactly what they wanted to see – the _aberrant_ , the _freak_ , the _threat_ in pain, neutralised. She sees exactly what she hadn’t dared hope to see; an ally.

Dancing is a lot like fighting; at their core, their roots, they are very much the same. Both are driven by a passion, and if they manifest differently, that in no way alters their basic nature. Mikasa knows how to fight and she knows how to dance and she knows that the captain is doing neither.

His muscles are tight, locked beneath his uniform; she has seen him use his gear, even if only briefly, and she can’t begin to imagine how uncomfortable it must be for him to ignore every instinct screaming at him. Power, force, whatever she chooses to call it, comes from a relaxed form and loose stance. Even at this distance she can see the quiver beginning in his arms and legs as he keeps them tense – the blows are for show only, and though they must hurt Eren terribly, the damage is minimal.

So she ignores every instinct that screams at her to hack away at this man for daring to as much as _touch_ Eren. She ignores it, and watches, and waits.

 

*

 

By the time she sees Eren again, there is no trace of a broken nose, cracked ribs or missing tooth but she draws him close nonetheless, feels his familiar grin pressed against her cheek. In the time that the three of them have been separated, Armin is the only thing that’s kept her sane. She glances over Eren’s shoulder to see the captain just turning away; she glares at him because she feels that it’s what she should do, what’s expected of her, but really she is just watching him walk.

It is nothing like in the courtroom – he is loose and fluid and perfectly comfortable with his body, with how it moves. She has no doubt that, had he wanted to, he could have killed Eren.

They fall back into their rhythm as naturally as breathing, the three of them always close enough to touch. Until Mina pointed it out, she had never taken any notice of the way they gravitated around one another; even now, she rarely gives it a second thought, and yet, she can see the way that people – of the scouting legion, and of their own friends – stare at Eren. She and Armin close around him, flanking him without flinching. Let them stare, she thinks. He saved their lives.

That night, Eren doesn’t come to them as she had expected – so instead, she and Armin go to find him. It doesn’t take them long. Despite the size of the castle and the sometimes unfathomable ways of the scouting legion, there are only so many places that they would be keeping him.

The two guards standing outside the door are pale, with sympathy-pinched faces, and even before they reach the end of the corridor, Mikasa can hear Eren’s bitten-off sobs.

Initially, their path is blocked, but it takes only a few softly-spoken words from Armin to get them through. Since the fall of Trost, he has been different; more assured of his own self, but quieter too, and just… not as he was. She doesn’t know what to make of it, and so she offers him her presence, her support, and as close to understanding as she can manage. She doubts that any of them will be truly the same as they were ever again.

Eren had not taken the death of his comrades well. Perhaps, in some capacity, he blames himself; Mikasa wishes she could find the words to tell him that that is not, could never be the case.

He takes her hand, and Armin’s, and draws them close to him; when he manages an unsteady smile, she thinks that he knows.

 

*

 

The next morning, the captain passes her, talking with squad leader Hanji. He wears an over-large coat and a faintly approving expression that he turns on them as they walk by.

She thinks that he knows, too.

 

*

 

Hanji is delighted to have a new test subject, but from what Mikasa can glean, any variation of delighted, fascinated, or amazed seems to be their default. Not that it is their fault, she supposes – opportunities like this can’t come along very often. Nevertheless, the very thought of Eren being seen as nothing more than a specimen for examination makes her blood boil and her fists curl. In fact, of the three of them, Eren seems to take his new status the best. Though sometimes bored to tears by their droning, he seems just as eager to learn more about himself as Hanji.

One of the first things that they decide to do is put Eren through his paces – it seems simple enough, like training and drills all over again, except with Hanji off to the side, making diligent notes and muttering constantly.

Mikasa hardly noticed when Eren started attracting a crowd, but soon she was being jostled every which way as hardened soldiers fought to secure a good view of humanity’s newest saviour. Evidently, even the elite scouting legion are not immune to the incurable gossip that infiltrates the military. Already she has heard some outrageous claims; she makes a note to share them with Eren later on. They are certain to make him laugh.

(By that evening there are a whole host of new tales in circulation, because Armin can be devious and Eren can be competitive, and Mikasa likes to watch brutal curiosity turn to fear and respect.)

Still, she muses, watching Hanji test Eren’s reflexes – and perhaps his healing abilities, too – by throwing sharp objects at his face. At least they won’t be bored.

 

*

 

The muttering surrounding the three of them increases, but for the life of her, Mikasa can’t figure out what it is that they’ve done this time. She doesn’t think that it can be anything too terrible, as they haven’t been called up to explain themselves to any superiors, but it’s making her terribly paranoid. Conversations literally stop when they enter a room, and even Eren’s new squad have started to behave in an odd fashion; whispering and conspiring like school children. It is not until Armin mentions something about ‘casually overhearing’ some soldiers talking about _Jaeger, yes_ the _Jaeger, how many do you suppose there are?_ that it clicks.

There must be plenty of soldiers here that remember Shinganshina before the fall – there must also, she would wager, be several that grew up there, and so know its customs.

How many of them, she wonders, have made the connection between Eren and the infamous Jaeger that continued to astound each and every Day of Sacrifice? At least one, as it so happens, because not long after, the three of them are called into Commander Erwin’s office, where they stand before his desk like naughty schoolchildren, or criminals before a jury.

Levi and Hanji are there also, she notes; as neither of them look any worse off than usual, she can only assume that they are not here for anything too serious. Erwin smiles at them; she has to fight the urge to run, run and never look back. She doesn’t trust that smile. It is smooth as oil, and it slides away just as fast.

“So,” he begins, voice as gentle as she suspects it has ever been. “I have been informed that the three of you are from Shinganshina – is that correct?”

They do not look at each other, despite the crawling beneath her skin that insists she take comfort from the presence of her family. This is not a man to show your weaknesses to; this is a man that you trick, like a bird feigning a broken wing, hiding the flaw in its defences with a different, imagined one.

“That’s right, sir,” Armin replies, chin tilted back to expose his throat. _You don’t scare us,_ he says with everything but his voice.

“Then you will, of course, be familiar with the rituals of the Day of Sacrifice that were most common there,” Erwin continues, looking down and away, shuffling papers on his desk. They are not fooled; he is acutely aware of their every movement. His long hands fold together with a whisper of skin and he looks back up at them, eyebrows furrowing. “We find ourselves now short of motivation – even with the shifter abilities of Volkov here –”

“Jaeger,” Eren cuts in, his voice tight. Hanji perks up immediately, Erwin’s hands go slack, and even Levi stands away from the wall and uncrosses his arms. Despite his sometimes overwhelming nature, Eren has always been carefully polite to the people that he respects. Eren taps out an uneasy rhythm against his thigh. “I go by Jaeger. Sir.”

“Jaeger, then,” Erwin concedes. “As I was saying, we are running short on motivation and low on morale; I have decided that something needs to be done to bolster their spirits. A surprising number of recruits are from the outskirts of Wall Maria, and participated in the festivals that took place there – I would like the three of you to assist in the planning and preparations for something of a similar nature,” here, he pauses to smile his oil-slick smile, “since you also were raised to participate. As well as that, I would like for you to raise awareness amongst the new recruits, and encourage them to lend their aid wherever possible.”

Now that he seems to be done speaking, Mikasa risks glancing to the side, at Eren and Armin, both of whom are wearing matching grins. It’s been so long since she saw them smile like children, and she feels her own face soften into a gentle smile. The traditions of Shinganshina are not engraved in her bones the way they are for them; nonetheless, it is a time when she was happy.

“Yes, sir,” Armin replies brightly

 

*

 

She says nothing when she walks in on the special ops squad falling over their own feet while Eren looks on critically and Levi sits calmly drinking tea.

(She can’t restrain herself, though, when she walks in on Connie and Sasha trying to fumble their way through a waltz. They’ll never hear the end of that.)

 

*

 

Mikasa spends an entire afternoon showing her classmates how to make bunting; they take to it with surprising enthusiasm, and are quickly joined by more and more soldiers as word of what they’re doing gets around. She looks down at the swathes of fabric and smiles to herself.

 

*

 

There are people here that were raised to be bakers, seamstresses, craftsmen, artists, musicians, singers, and to look around, it is as though they have been reborn. The castle is full of noise, full of chatter and laughter, and Mikasa thinks how incredible it is that such a little thing can bring about such a change in battle-worn troops.

She helps Eren practice his dance, though she thinks that he will be performing it alone; it is something that he has opened out to her and shared with her, but that does not make it hers. Armin joins them sometimes, plucking idly at the instrument – a type of lute, he tells her – that he has conjured up from who-knows-where.

It brings back memories of flower fields and narrow alleyways; despite everything, she has never felt so safe.

 

*

 

The day of their own festival dawns, and Mikasa is not surprised to see that near enough everyone is up early and outside before she has had time to rub the sleep from her eyes. Eren is awake, and being trailed by Petra and Gunther when he hurries into the room she shares with Sasha. The commotion is enough to wake the other girl, who sits with tousled hair and bleary eyes. Armin follows them in at a slightly more sedate pace, though he looks no less excited.

They settle themselves on her bed, ignoring the looks that Petra and Gunther level at them. Eren is nearly shaking; he always gets like this before a festival, Armin told her once, always works himself into a frenzy of nervous energy. She runs her fingers through his hair to still him.

Armin presses closer to them until their knees knock together – a quick glance at the other side of the room shows that Sasha is up, and gathering together her civvies. There aren’t many people that will be wearing their uniform today. Eren has chosen his usual attire, with the absence of his 3DMG straps, whilst Armin wears a loose cotton shirt and trousers with a cardigan thrown haphazardly over the top.

They wait impatiently while she gets dressed; a long skirt seems practical given the heat of the past few days, and a light shirt. She deliberately takes longer than she would do normally, amusing herself with their impatience.

When she is finally ready, they drag her back to Armin’s room – he shares it with Jean, but as he has already left for the day, they have it more-or-less to themselves. The dancing will not begin for another few hours, though as a musician, Armin will have to leave first to set up and prepare. For the moment, he rests his head in Eren’s lap, talking animatedly about the logistics of preparing a festival of this scale, whilst Eren brushes blond hair away from his forehead. Mikasa curls herself around them, takes them in her arms and holds them there; they continue on as though they haven’t noticed, but she feels them lean against her, warm and alive.

No doubt this’ll start the rumour mill grinding, but she doesn’t care much. For a long time, this was all she had; she learnt to savour it.

Eventually, Armin pushes himself upright and stretches, padding over to his chest of drawers and pulling out the flowers and sash that have been stowed so carefully away in there. Eren had insisted upon them, stating that his mother had worn variants on them every year; to perform the Jaeger without them would be an insult to her. So, Mikasa had spent hours with a needle and thread, fingers pricked and bleeding, but she had at last created a pattern that she deemed adequate. Armin had chosen the flowers, triumphantly producing an armful of what he called purple columbines. _Just don’t eat them,_ he laughed, and Mikasa made a mental note to never so much as touch them without glove.

Eren seems to have no such qualms, as he sits patiently to allow Armin to braid them into locks of his hair. The colour is vivid against the dark of his hair, and she wishes absently that she had incorporated more of it into his sash.

Armin leaves them earlier than expected after making sure that the flowers are not about to fall away as soon as he turns his back. Eren laughs as he waves Armin away, shrugging off his shirt in the process. None of the flowers get caught, and so Armin is satisfied.

“Arms up,” she instructs Eren quietly – he fidgets something terrible, and she won’t be able to tie the sash properly if his twitching hands are in her way.

“I can do it myself, you know,” he says, following her instructions anyway.

“I know,” she says. “That’s not the point.” He doesn’t ask her what the point is. He knows already.

They remain in silence as Mikasa finishes off the complex knot and stands back to admire her work. Eren leans forward until his head rests against her shoulder – she curls a hand around the nape of his neck.

“Thank you,” he mumbles against her shirt – it is obvious that he doesn’t just mean the sash. She nods. He probably wouldn’t appreciate anything more.

Eventually, though, they have to shatter the moment, and the stand apart, suddenly filled to over spilling with excitement again. Mikasa presses a kiss to Eren’s brow before she hurries away, skirt tangling round her calves as she run, giddy and weightless like a child. She knows that he won’t join with the earlier dances, but that doesn’t mean that she can’t.

As soon as she steps out into the courtyard, she is swept away by a hand on her wrist, into a winding chain where the only object appears to be mimicking the person in front. She laughs once, bright and startled, when she sees Sasha at the front of the chain, closely followed by Christa and Ymir. Never before has she heard such a mad stampede and chorus. It looks as though almost the entire scouting legion has turned their hand to _something_ , be it the food, the song or the dance. The chain takes her past a stall pouring spiced cider, and she stops for a small glass, already flushed with exertion. Idly, she wonders what the Inner City bigwigs would think if they could see the commotion.

The thought is almost enough to make her laugh aloud.

Rows of bunting bounce overhead in the light wind that has started to pick up, drying the sweat on her face.

A stranger asks her to dance; she accepts, and is soon swept away again in the heady rhythm of feet against cobbles and racing hearts. The music is almost secondary to the thrumming in her veins, the pounding in her mind. She dances with countless people – by the time she finds her way to the edge of the crowd, she is more out-of-breath than she can ever remember being. Still, a quick glance at the clock hung from a nearby pulley system shows that the competition will be starting soon.

Frankly, she has no idea of what to expect. It is every bit as strange and exciting as the Day of Sacrifice had once been to her; she watches the first dancers eagerly.

It quickly becomes clear that few of them are trained dancers, and yet, a misstep here or there is easily forgiven in the wake of their sheer enthusiasm. _Dancing is the overflow of emotion_ , Carla used to say. _A poorly-executed dance will always look better than a dance with no feeling_.

And so she watches them; solos, pairs, groups, watches them all with the same fascination of a child sat on her father’s shoulders, watching the dancers with the bells go by.

When Eren steps out, the crowd falls into an eerie hush before exploding into whispers. He makes a striking image, and for a moment he looks so very like his mother that it make’s Mikasa’s heart hurt to look at him. He is barefoot against the mats set down for the dancers. She hoists herself up onto the roof of the stables to get a better view, and his eyes find her as he scans the crowd warily. As he walks, he sways slightly, buffeted side to side by a non-existent storm. He is, however, perfectly steady when he comes to stand at the centre of the ring formed by the onlookers.

The dance begins with Eren crouched near to the ground, as it always does. She can see his sides heaving already as he prepares himself for what comes first. Though there are no set movements, the Jaeger consists of patterns, and she knows that the beginning is always the most difficult.

The first movements of the dance are slow and consist of small, tightly controlled movements – a flick of the foot, a twist, catching his weight on bent arms.

Everything looks deceptively gentle and easy, but she has felt the aches that come with this sort of training, and the strength required is incredible. His torso remains angled towards the ground, and the muscles in his arms bunch tight as they strain against the force of the earth, pulling him down. She can hear the mutters of disappointment swelling around her, but Eren is oblivious.

And then he picks up the pace.

As always, the shift takes the audience by surprise; his movements are broader now, sweeping and reaching, spinning and leaping. There is an opponent that only he can see; Mikasa wonders if it has his mother’s face. His weight lifts and drops with stunning grace as he is felled by his attacker, and brings them down also with a well-placed kick. His twisting jumps grow ever more ambitious, yet he lands silently with deliberate motions.

It is as though he has no ties to the ground he steps on – as though he only comes back down because he so chooses.

His feet, when they move against the mats, are unstoppable. Eren looks as though he could dance forever, the bright slashes of colour the only clear thing about him when he spins. Everything he does has weight, has purpose, and she knows that if she could make out his face, his grin would be a wild, feral thing.

_He_ is a wild feral thing. A predator at night, that makes no move without consideration. It is so different to his usual self, and yet still so much the same.

This is the boy she remembers saving her life. This whirlwind of a child that stormed in and tore apart everything she thought she knew. _This_ is the Jaeger.

As the dance reaches its final stages, Eren slows again – barely enough to be noticeable, but she knows. He will continue to slow so gradually that the audience will hardly realise it is happening until he has stopped completely. In this part of the dance, it is as though he has uncoiled. Everything is delicate.

The focus of this is now poise, balance and rhythm. Gone are the leaps, gone is the crouch; now, Eren bends and sways, holds himself perfectly still before throwing himself down. His face is flushed, sweat running down his sides, but there will not be many that focus on such inconsequential details. The Jaeger is a dance, and a fight and a tale all told together with only his body – there is little wonder why it captivates so. The movements are hypnotic, almost, and certainly like nothing most of the legion has seen before.

When Eren finishes, on his hands and utterly still, there is a moment of silence. It is not until he rolls back to his feet that the clapping starts, wild and furious. It sounds like a stampede, and Mikasa pushes her way forwards even as Eren doubles over, breathless and giddy. Armin comes rushing forward with her, and the three of them collide.

Out of the corner of her eye, she can see the recruits of their class stepping out with praise on their lips, and she holds her boys just a little tighter.

Her laugh tastes of honey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you that would like to see how I personally imagined the Jaeger, please watch the following videos and just smoosh them together in your brain.  
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8xxgFpK-NM,   
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbW6ErTogio,  
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iIYWsY5NE4
> 
> Thanks for reading!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [O Brightening Glance [PODFIC]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2791496) by [Opalsong](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Opalsong/pseuds/Opalsong)




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